Education

PhD, University of Colorado
MA, University of Colorado
BA, University of Dayton

Profile

Erica Chenoweth is Assistant Professor of Government at Wesleyan University. Beginning in July 2012, she will be an Assistant Professor at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver, where she will teach courses on international relations, terrorism, civil war, nonviolent resistance, and contemporary warfare.

Chenoweth is currently a Visiting Scholar in residence at the Institute of International Studies at the University of California at Berkeley, and a Visiting Scholar at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. Previously, Chenoweth held fellowships at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, UC-Berkeley, and the University of Maryland. She is currently an Academic Adviser at the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict and serves as a Board Member of the International Security and Arms Control Section of the American Political Science Association. She was the 2010 recipient of the Carol A. Baker Memorial Prize, which recognizes excellence in junior faculty teaching and research at Wesleyan. 

Chenoweth’s books include Why Democracy Encourages Terrorism (under contract with Columbia University Press); and Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict (Columbia University Press, August 2011) with Maria J. Stephan of the U.S. State Department. She also co-edited Rethinking Violence: States and Non-State Actors in Conflict (MIT Press, 2010) with Adria Lawrence of Yale University.

Chenoweth’s research program involves three main questions: why do non-state groups use political violence, what are the alternatives to political violence, and how can states best combat non-state political violence? Her current book project, tentatively entitled Why Democracy Encourages Terrorism (under contract with Columbia University Press), investigates the reasons why non-state actors resort to violence in democracies despite the availability of legal methods of protest. Her findings suggest that political competition within democracies compels conventional interest groups to compete, causing a “cascade effect” in which groups escalate their tactics to outbid one another for power. The research for this project was partially funded through a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship from the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), a Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence at the University of Maryland.

In another project, Why Civil Resistance Works (with Maria Stephan), Chenoweth researches the conditions under which nonviolent resistance methods are more effective than violent methods in achieving strategic goals such as regime change, expelling foreign occupiers, or achieving self-determination. In fall 2009, Chenoweth commenced a follow-up project that investigates how the tactical evolutions of nonviolent and violent insurgencies have affected their strategic outcomes.

Chenoweth is also co-lead investigator on a project entitled Dealing with the Devil: When Bargaining with Terrorists Works (with Laura Dugan). This project assesses the efficacy of different counterterrorism policies in the Middle East since 1980 as part of a broader set of projects affiliated with START.

In addition to her book projects, Chenoweth’s work is published in International Security, The Journal of Politics, Political Research Quarterly, Defense and Security Analysis, and Review of Policy Research.

She has also contributed chapters to several volumes, including The Making of a Terrorist: Recruitment, Training, and Root Causes, ed. James Forest (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2005), Homeland Security: Protecting America’s Targets, ed. James Forest (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2006), Countering Terrorism in the 21st Century, ed. James Forest (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2007), Handbook of Defence Politics: International and Comparative Perspectives, ed. Ike Wilson and James Forest (London: Routledge, 2009), Corruption, Global Security, and World Order, ed. Robert I. Rotberg

(Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2009), and Coping With Contemporary Terrorism: Origins, Escalation, Counter-Strategies, and Responses, ed. William R. Thompson and Rafael Reuveny (SUNY Press, 2010).

In 2008, Chenoweth established the Program on Terrorism and Insurgency Research, a center that produces policy-relevant research on the causes and effects of insurgency, terrorism, and strategic nonviolent resistance.

The center houses multiple projects and provides interested students with opportunities to engage in research related to the program’s mission.

Chenoweth has presented her research throughout the United States and Europe at academic conferences, government workshops, and international governmental organizations. Her research has taken her to Turkey, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Greece, Slovenia, Denmark, Sweden, Hungary, Norway, and Albania. She has provided security analysis as both a consultant and a commentator, with regular appearances in the print media and on domestic and foreign radio programs. Her research has been featured in The New York Times, Foreign Policy, The Economist, The Boston Globe, The Christian Science Monitor, and elsewhere. She hosts a blog called Rational Insurgent, and she is an occasional blogger at The Monkey Cage and Duck of Minerva.

Chenoweth received an M.A. and a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Colorado and a B.A. in political science and German from the University of Dayton.

Courses

INTS 4709-Topics:  Civil Resistance
INTS 4702-Major Issues in International Security